MALAWI AT A GLANCE

Pope · Guru

MALAWI AT A GLANCE

abre les ojos · Guru

Let me throw a spanner into the works. There's no way out. The country will always be poor and it is bound to get poorer as the rest of the world goes forward. Mozambique even after years of civil war is actually growing faster than Malawi. Too bad it'll always be poor and destitute.

Unless, you got rid of all those old politicians and bring in new blood with more radical ideas for development.

Mulopwana · Veteran Member

Abre

If you have nothing to contribute on this topic then just shut up your big mouth. You already said that you have nothing to do with Malawi so what else can you say apart from castigating our mother Malawi. You want to brainwash everybody here in embracing your beliefs.

Politically. For me I have always thought that we need to change our political system. I have a strong belief that multiparty politcs is not good for a country like Malawi. Our leaders are very busy politicking instead of thinking of how to move our country forward. You will agree with me that Muluzi campaigned for the whole 10yrs he was in power. For him what mattered most was his political survival and that UDF remained in power forever. The same is seen today in Bingu's adminstration. He is busy buying MPs and selling DPP to the people. If we had one party, this question could not be there. I know most of you will not agree with me but I urge you to do a small research as to why countries which were poorer than us are now far much ahead. You will find that some are practicing one party system, monarch,etc. Multiparty politics is expensive. There is alot of appeasement which accounts for about 10% of the money meant for development.

Economically. When we just got independence, Kamuzu might have assessed the country and realised that we could only advance economically if we took agriculture seriously and of which we did. It helped but with the condition we are now, there is need to do another assessment. At the moment as country its like we are caught with our pants down with our neighbour's wife. We have formulated alot of papers and one tend to wonder which one we are following at the moment.

Attitude. We can be a stable country politically and with alot of potential for economic growth but if we dont work hard, there is no way our country can move forward. The way things are at the moment in Malawi is that very few people are really working. The majority of people would want to earn for free including the VP. If only 2% of the population is involved in economic activities, do you think we can move as a country.

abre les ojos · Guru

Mulopwana wrote:

Abre

If you have nothing to contribute on this topic then just shut up your big mouth. You already said that you have nothing to do with Malawi so what else can you say apart from castigating our mother Malawi. You want to brainwash everybody here in embracing your beliefs.

[

Just my opinion. Don't care if you take it or not...

Pope · Guru

abre les ojos wrote:

[ Just my opinion. Don't care if you take it or not...

serious!!!

Ayatollah · Senior Member

Pope, this has always been an interesting topic among the intelligentsia around the world. In absolute terms, it's hard to come up with one right answer. However one thing that has puzzled me for a long time about Malawi is the fact that even though our literacy rates are very low, Malawi has a lot of trained economists. I remember since the early days of Kamuzu, each and every economist that joined the Economic Planning Development Department was sent overseas for a Masters Degree and others were even lucky to go for Phd's.

My question is, "what do these people do with their qualifications once they go back home?" You know what, they go back and sit phwii instead of helping steer the country in the right direction. They come back with New TV's, Stereos, a few designer clothes, and may be a second hand car from Japan or England. That is where the satisfaction ends! It is sad that most Malawians do not take pride in being Malawians and they do not give a rats asss about their contribution to the country. It's all about what can Malawi do for me instead of what can I do for my country and my fellow country men. This is why you see many people enriching themselves at the expense of the masses whenever they get an opportunity. It's so sickening!

Yes! there is nothing wrong with making money through legit means. There is definitely something wrong with making money at the expense of the poor people. It's so sad we are a very greedy and selfish people. Need I give examples??? When ever there is disaster in Malawi, few rich people are willing to open their wallets to help those in need. Yet, we expect foreigners to help us with each and every little problem that we face as a people. I am sick and tired of the way we as a people look at things.

game · Guru

well,welcome back Ayats,anyway i think malawi needs to stop relying so much on foreign aid,look at malawis industrial system,it cannot subsist on internal resources alone but has to extend its tentacles right around the donor community,just imagin whenever estimates are produced which relate to ten twenty years,te message that emerges is one of ever increasing dependence on raw material and natural resources from foreign countries.

we have alot of intelligentias in malawi but they dont help to fulfill the aspirations of our country,look at the unemployment rate which is on rapid growth every day,even these intelligentias encourage nepotism,if malawi was a fully employed high growth economy,chances to free public and private resources the battle against poverty would have been won,slowly kamuzu was taking us to the promised land but old age took its toll and malawi just plunged headlong into this abyss and noone seems to care.

i know alot of malawians that only know how to talk but never walk the walk,its a pity but i tell you malawians can never grow together as one people because of envy,greed and looking through their windows like some voyeur just to see what business the neighbour has opened so they can also open the same.

abre les ojos · Guru

There was a quote by Nehru in the 50s. When he was asked what he thought about the brain drain that was happening to his country, he said "better brain drain, than brain in the drain".

That's pretty much my position. It is better to have a bunch of Malawi intelligentsia scattered around the world than none at all, nowhere. or worse unproductive. Eventually the country would reap the rewards of it.

The path to African development - and we can only look at Malawi development in term of the whole of Africa - requires some really radical politics. It is essentially a political decision. We can have the most intelligent economists in the country, but without the political drive nothing would happen.

The policies for change have to start from the top. It's that simple.

I think we take for granted the cliche of African Unity. For one, it has never actually happened since the drive for independence from the Imperialist west. Africa needs to take lessons from South America and its new found confidence in resisting intimidation from the west.

But for starters, you cannot resist western influence unless you have a viable alternative (see Zimbabwe for that lesson). A serious consensus needs to be discussed by African leaders. This consensus should be detached from the political structure first to resist the influence of the present corrupt elite that has already been bought by western influence.

I can go on and on but I haven't really articulated my theories yet. This is just my pipe dream.

Date: Mar 22, 2006

The Malawian democracy is bulky. It doesn't help that the whole system (especially the civil service & legislature) is based, almost with no modification, on western models which have developed & crstalised over centuries in a western context (& were outdated even before we adopted them). Democracy's fine, Malawi's just needs some major tweaking.

Brandy1 · Veteran Member

Damn Ayats, mwabwelanso. Why do you bother with kutsanzika? Next time you go some place pitani mwakachetechete so that we won't be suprised to see you back. Anyway poti bwaloli ndi latonse, welcome back, but next time remember it's better kusiya phazi than kusiya mlomo.

sepusepu · Senior Member

Mulopwa,

When Kamuzu came to power agriculture seemed to be the way to take Malawi to a higher level. The problem is we as a country have not keep up with the world economy. At that time it was more of a regional economy but now with the information technology coming into play we have to think big and see how we can fit in this global economy. We have to Innovate, otherwise we will be at the bottom forever.

For example; we used to import alot of agricultural products from Zim but with the leaving of white farmers, the supply of these goods has declined. We as a nation should realise that this is an opportunity for us.

ETHICS

We can all point fingures to whoever we want to but we have to ask ourselves a few question.

Have we ever desired to ivade duty when shipping or travelling to Malawi?

Have you ever try to avoid to pay a tax or misused public assets?..........

You get the idea.

May be they should add an ethics class in secondary school.

There is a mentality that its a big organization (govt) and they wont miss it. The bad thing is that you are hurting your brotheres and sisters.

sepu

-- Edited by sepusepu at 07:05, 2006-03-23

Ayatollah · Senior Member

Brandy1 wrote:

Damn Ayats, mwabwelanso. Why do you bother with kutsanzika? Next time you go some place pitani mwakachetechete so that we won't be suprised to see you back. Anyway poti bwaloli ndi latonse, welcome back, but next time remember it's better kusiya phazi than kusiya mlomo.

Iwe Brande! Ukakhuta nsenga sikuti udziputana ndi ine. Nyani, galu, mfiti iwe!

Mulopwana · Veteran Member

sepusepu wrote:

ETHICS
We can all point fingures to whoever we want to but we have to ask ourselves a few question.
Have we ever desired to ivade duty when shipping or travelling to Malawi?
Have you ever try to avoid to pay a tax or misused public assets?..........
You get the idea.
May be they should add an ethics class in secondary school.
There is a mentality that its a big organization (govt) and they wont miss it. The bad thing is that you are hurting your brotheres and sisters.

I agree with you Sepusepu. The last time i went home i bought some electronic equipments for home use. Unfortunately they were less than six months old and the MRA asked me to pay duty. It was damn expensive and I was so furious. I vowed to makesure that the govt pays me back in one way or another of which it did. I feel bad after reading your posting. Anyway I will not do that again in future because i denied the govt money it could have used to buy drugs and food for the people.

Brandy1 · Veteran Member

Ayatollah wrote:

Iwe Brande! Ukakhuta nsenga sikuti udziputana ndi ine. Nyani, galu, mfiti iwe!

Love you too, babes!!!

Pope · Guru

Mulopwana wrote:

It was damn expensive and I was so furious. I vowed to makesure that the govt pays me back in one way or another of which it did. I feel bad after reading your posting. Anyway I will not do that again in future because i denied the govt money it could have used to buy drugs and food for the people.

The nation relies on tax and if you deny it then........... The other thing we need to look at is the perks our beloved brothers get in the civil service, which makes them tempted to corruption. It also brings a mind of laziness.

abre les ojos · Guru

Pope wrote:

The nation relies on tax and if you deny it then........... The other thing we need to look at is the perks our beloved brothers get in the civil service, which makes them tempted to corruption. It also brings a mind of laziness.

Civil servants are always considered "lazy". I am one, I know.

In Malawian terms 'though. The government "should" rely on tax but the tax system is in need of reform. Badly. Since the unemployment rate in Malawi is quite high and Asian businessmen constantly evading tax, it's no wonder government revenue is low and the country relies more on donations from foreign sources that have "agendas". How can you then produce a government that is accountable to its people when they don't really contribute to its coffers?

Pope · Guru

Good abre,you have brought this issue of Asian businessmen, if you go in most of retail shops in town they will neither give you cash sale or threaten you with a higher price if you insist,so that money he collects doesnt go to the bank neither to MRA. I have seen others making cash sales without a carbon paper.Most of these guys are good friends of superiors in govmnt.So what we need to do is tighten the loose in MRA, GIVE THEM INCENTIVES when they collect to their targets in their zones.

If I were MRA boss I would split the town into zones,and have zone supervisors whom I will ask for aanswers.I would make sure any shop in town have sequences in their invoices.I dont know how many shops we have as of today which am sure the same applies to MRA.

Mulopwana · Veteran Member

Pope,

That is very true. These asians need to be monitored. MRA can employ young boys who are just loitering in town to man a number of shops taking note of all the sales (through invoices) made per day. In this way they will be forced to pay VAT to the govt.